Study says $780M in restitution goes unpaid in Pa.

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania should be more aggressive in collecting restitution from criminals, including garnishing paychecks and suspending state-issued licenses, according to a task force report issued Tuesday that put the unpaid sum at more than $780 million.

The task force listed 47 ways state policymakers could address the problem, including devoting government workers to collections, more effectively using state-issued licenses as leverage, making procedures more consistent from county to county and attaching wages.

The study was funded by a $90,000 federal grant through the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency, and its recommendations were approved by a majority of the task force. Many of the proposals would require action by the Legislature, Supreme Court or county judges.

“The experiences of victims of crime in Pennsylvania, including their access to restitution compensation, vary significantly across the commonwealth,” said the 84-page report. “Differences in county-level policy and practice result in victims’ disparate access to remedies, including restitution. These discrepancies may lead to secondary victimization.”

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The 39-member task force said the state could begin taking money for unpaid restitution directly from lottery winnings, tax refunds or the defendants’ paychecks.

Historically, the panel said wage attachments have been opposed by employers on the grounds it would constitute a logistical headache.

“Today, wage attachment is a fairly routine practice, as it is often required for support obligations and can be voluntarily ordered in criminal proceedings,” the report said. The garnishment recommendations, which recommended that the General Assembly consider the idea, passed without opposition.

Over a recent three-year period, Pennsylvania courts imposed more than $434 million in restitution, but victims ended up with only about $50 million. The reasons for that, the task force said, are that about one-third of the defendants are jailed, payments by defendants also go to fines and fees, some restitution amounts are so large that they skew the numbers and payment plans can allow very low installments.

“Many payment plans are active for a significant number of years and often these plans become uncollectible over time,” the report said.

Victims also can move and be hard to locate — educating victims about the need for them to stay in touch with the court system would help, the task force said. It also suggested having defendants make payments through a single plan so that older cases are not ignored in favor of more recent restitution orders.

In a survey answered by 55 of the state’s 67 counties, nearly half said they did not collect restitution from inmate accounts, even though state law authorizes it.

Driver’s license suspensions have proven to be effective in getting people to pay what they owe, and that could be expanded to include other types of licenses, they said.

“If this enforcement tool would be available for all criminal offenses and also include other types licenses (i.e., professional, recreational, etc.) that are issued throughout the commonwealth, significant revenues would be realized for both victims and counties,” the report said.

Another suggestion is that cash posted as bail could be seized for restitution, costs or fines.

A member of the task force, York County Clerk of Courts Don O’Shell, said collections have more than doubled there since 2004 by using a more aggressive approach that sends out overdue notices, suspends driver’s licenses and makes use of contempt hearings. Like many other counties, he also contracts with private collection agencies, giving them a quarter of what they collect.

By the end of last year, the state courts’ computer system was helping 37 counties use collection agencies.

The report said that as of the end of August, state court records indicated nearly $2.3 billion was owed in restitution, costs, fines and fees. An Associated Press investigation in December 2007 said the total at that time was about $1.6 billion, including $638 million in owed restitution.

While the report dealt only with restitution, task force members said many of the techniques would also improve collection of costs, fines and fees.

Court officials noted those figures include some debts that go back to the 1980s, and that a study of 2007 restitution shows that five years later, 86 percent from district courts had been collected, while 21 percent from common pleas courts had been collected.

In 2007, prosecutors said collections would increase if judges ordered defendants to jail for nonpayment, but that sometimes conflicted with the goals of keeping released criminals employed and drug-free. Some judges believe throwing convicts in jail for not making restitution payments seems too much like debtor’s prison.